Life in Mono
by Xenoglossy
Summary: A ExS shortlet- Syaoran deals badly with love and loss, but is Eriol really just trying to heal a broken heart- or is it something more?


**PRE FIC RANTINGS AND A SPRINKLE OF DISCALIMER:** I usually balk at the idea of writing slash without due explaination- okay, well, I'll admit that isn't COMPLETELY true, but in all my half-started and half-done CCS fics I attempt to explain perfectly logical reasons for non-canon relationships. And good explainations, not just: "Oh well, you see, it didn't work out with Sakura because she was actually a Tomoyo-loving lesbian" (not that I'm trying to insult Sakura/Tomoyo shippers, mind you).  
So, in telling you that I hope you will forgive me my moment of POINTLESS ExS. It's not actually pointless- the point is there is not enough ExS fanfiction out there, so I've taken it upon myself to spread the love. Or, um, whatever the hell it is I'm writing. ^ ^;;  
The idea (and first line) popped into my head whislt listening to the ubercool song 'Life in Mono' by, um, 'Mono' (I think they mean mono as in 'monorail sound' not the illness). Hence the title. ^ ^ It's been a long time since I've written a fic for the sake of slashing. I feel nostalgic!  
I don't own Card Captor Sakura and I really hate writing disclaimers because not matter what, they make me sound stupid. Maybe I should just start stating burgeois legalities instead of trying to personalize these things like every other fangirl on the internet? Life in Mono  
_Izzy Girl 'And I just don't know what to do...'_ "Just how related are we. Exactly?" the question fell unbidded from Syaoran's mouth, and he was rather confused at how and why the irrational thought had come into his mind in the first place. Coming from an ancient family so obsessed with archaic tradition, when was he ever one concerned with such trite things as loose incest? He had spent the better half of his life engaged to a close cousin, afterall. Nevertheless, he asked it and at the inquiry, Eriol was momentarily deterred from his task of neatly undoing the tiny buttons on Syaoran's shirt. The dark-haired boy pursed his lips and aquired a reflective expression, absently stroking Syaoran's cheek with his left thumb while the forefinger of his other hand tapped his own chin thoughtfully. "You know..." he began, his tone careful and percise, "I've never really thought about that Xiao Lang." "Well, a rough estimate at the least." A bemused smile worked it's way up Eriol's lips and Syaoran was reminded of the mage's inability to appear anything less than evil when wearing a grin. Eriol moved his thumb softly along the ridges of Syaoran's high cheekbones and rested it across the boy's reddened lips, "Does it really bother you so much? Or is it just another excuse?" Syaoran twisted his lower lip beneath the pale thumb and raised his gaze, studying the dusty and corroded ceiling of the janitor's closet, crisscrossed with spiderwebs and lit only by the generous cracks beneath the doorframe and that strange, invisible glow that seemed to illuminate Eriol wherever he went. Syaoran dropped his eyes again and squinted. At least he thought Eriol illuminated light, though he wasn't sure if this was part of his own imagination or simply due to the reincarnation's over-active magical aura. He shifted slightly, uncomfortable with the closeness of their bodies. "I have my excuse." he muttered, batting Eriol's hand away with a glare, "It's your damn aura." Eriol chuckled throatily and drew back a few steps, leaning heavily against the other wall of the enclosed closet. Syaoran took the chance to rebutton his shirt and catch his breath. "I'm the reincarnation of your great grandfather removed fourteen times. Since my body is nothing more than a magical vessel, we're not blood related per say, but our spiritual relation is no more significant than, say, your relation to Sakura-san." Syaoran blinked a few times, processing this information, before grumbling out a jumbled: "Well that's good to know." Eriol raised an eyebrow and looked as if he were about to comment, but his unspoken words were interrupted by the sharp ring of the post-noon bell. Within seconds, Eriol's face had blanked neutral and he was all business. He spared Syaoran a final, suggestive glance before sweeping open the creaky door. He bowed gracefully, gentleman like and nodded graciously in the chinese boy's direction. "After you." .+ . + . "Aie, Li-kun. You don't look so well." Chiharu poked his back discreetly with the tip of her mechanical pencil and shot Tomoyo one of those annoyingly knowing glances girls often share with each other when speaking of the foolishness of men. "Indeed." Yamazaki nodded knowingly at overhearing the offhand comment. He leaned over conspicously opening his narrow eyes and peering curiously at the chinese boy for a long moment before holding up his finger and exclaiming, "Looks like the dreaded Lillupulian fever. It's an ancient plauge that swept across fuedal Japan in the heian period. I'm afraid that only commoners are susceptible to it, Li-kun, as everyone alive in Japan today has a built in immunity towards it. Very fatal. I would advise medical attention immedietly, but I doubt it will help much. You're as good as dea... ow!" Yamazaki rubbed his neck defenisvely and shot Chiharu a shocked glance over his shoulder, "What was that for!?" "You're being ridiculous." Chiharu growled, tapping her long fingernails against the table angrily, "Don't say such things to poor Li-kun. He's very gulliable." Syaoran grimaced at this remark and probably would have said something in his own self defense, but he had learnt long ago that to interfere in Chiharu and Yamazaki's little spats was to tempt fate. "I was just having a bit of fun, Chi-chan. Really, I meant no harm." "I doubt that's the kind of fun Li-kun appreciates Ta-ka-ha-shi." she pronounced every sylabelle of his name distinctly, practically grating her teeth as she did so, "Sometimes I wonder if you really just do it for fun, or if you're a pathological liar." "What, me?" Yamazaki's face became the very vision of innocence and he placed a hand to his heart delicately, "Chi-chan, must you hold such terrible opinions of me!?" "Only because I know you." Syaoran watched the verbal ballet continue for a few moments before sighing and laying his head back down on the desk, watching as the jaded teacher slowly etched a right triangle into the chipping blackboard. _"Do you love me?"_ The teacher's dark hands were stained with chalk. Syaoran sat close enough to the board that he could see how the white, dry dust had worked it's way into the old man's hands, running in rivets and rivers through the lines and curves of his fingers. _"Of course. I told you that I loved you, didn't I?"_ It was as if the math had intwined itself with his old body, imprinted on his soul and coded into his brain until the method and the man were unseperable. _"That's not what I meant. What I'm trying to ask is... do you love ME. Do you love me for WHO I am, not WHAT I am?"_ Syaoran wondered if it was like that with everyone. If you persist at something for long enough, pour you life, soul and heart into it would you begin to take it's shape? Would your goals and your accomplishments physically become a part of you a point at which someone could take one look at you and automatically cite your personality? _"I... I'm afraid I don't understand..."_ If this was true, then was it only applicable to proffesion? What about behavioral patterns and personality weaknesses? If someone repeated a mistake often enough would they begin to form around that mistake until their personage was so intwined in it they would continue to make the mistake over and over again until there was nothing left in them but broken dreams and a crumbled heart? _"Then... maybe that's the problem."_ "Syaoran? What's wrong?" Tomoyo had pushed her head through the mini-disaster that was Chiharu and Yamazaki and studied Syaoran with a disturbingly perceptive lavendar-eyed gaze. Syaoran stared at her for a few seconds, wondering to himself just how much she knew, then placed his finger across his lips. "Shh, Tomoyo." he whispered, "We mustn't talk during the lesson." . + . + . "Everyone changes." _Everyone is influenced by power._ "People grow up and grow apart." _But what if I really loved you?_ "It's only temporary." _Until you realize it's a better life than I could ever offer you._ "I'll be back, you'll see. Then maybe we can try again." _This is probably the last time we'll ever see each other._ "I'll always love you." _Don't you even care?_ Sometimes one must read their own emotions to find the text inbetween the lines. It's a well known fact that life hardly follows a script and usually the truth of the matter is buried deep underneath the words and the lies and sometimes even in what the truth may appear to be. Syaoran liked to think that he was talented at reading the secret lines in interpersonal interactions, and had in fact understood what Sakura was trying to say before she opened her mouth. Unfortunately, time had proved him wrong as it does most things and it became apparent that he was merely self absorbed. "Sakura wasn't trying to hurt you." Oh no, of course she hadn't been trying to hurt anyone. Sakura was not a mean spirited person. "Sakura really did love you." Maybe she did, maybe she didn't. Syaoran never could figure that one out because the whole love thing was not something he completely understood himself. Sakura certainly thought she loved him, otherwise she wouldn't have wasted so many years on him. "Sakura is just trying to find herself." You had to give her that. Time and patience because, after all, Sakura was just a little girl caught all up in the whirlwind of magic and love and life and really, she hadn't been prepared for it so she didn't know what to do. "Sakura would want you to move on." Syaoran didn't exactly call it moving on, but it was progress at least. Or at least he would like to think so because if he moved on it would make Sakura happy and he really did want Sakura to be happy wherever she was, whatever she was doing and whenever she would finally 'find herself'. It wasn't a concious decision and Syaoran himself considered it to, in fact, have been an accident. They were talking about math. Just math, triginometry in fact. Co signs and tangents and right angles and Syaoran had never found math in the slightest bit sexy so how it led to kissing was anybody's guess. They were in the library of all places, nestled into a rarely used studying corner behind a shelf of books-on-tape, sitting entirely too close together arguing over the math homework. Eriol was tracing lines in the table with the eraser of his pencil as he whispered viciously about the proper application of the Pythagoran theorom to a particular problem when the quiet fell upon them. It was strange, because it was impossible for it to be completely quiet anywhere unless you were completely alone, locked in your mind in the middle of nowhere with not even the wind to keep you company. There is even a certain din in silence, the whistle of the void around you. Halfway through Eriol's impassioned sentence (funny how the British boy got so worked up over schoolwork), it was if all sound dropped away from the Earth. Eriol's lips moved wordlessly and the faint echo of milling people muted. Even the rustling of the breeze beyond the glass of the window pain was cut off abruptly. It was all very real and for a moment, Syaoran panicked because it seemed as if he were going deaf. He widened his eyes as if it would help him hear and when he gasped even that was silent. "Hiiragizawa." he mouthed, unsure of how loud he was speaking. He grabbed the other boy's arm and watched in slow motion as Eriol raised a dark eyebrow and regarded him, opening and closing his mouth in long, voiceless words. And then they were kissing. These sort of things happen quickly, Syaoran learned, as he was not exactly sure how it happened. All he knew for sure was that when their lips met he could hear the blood rushing to his head and gradually, all the other noises came back to him. It felt as if those sounds were liquid color, airborne and invisiable and his ears drank them in greedily. He and Eriol parted a moment later, both red-faced and panting slightly. Syaoran blinked as his mind processed it all and Eriol gulped heavily, picking up his pencil casually and tapping it against his neatly printed math work. "And that, Li-kun, is why you can't just substitute a normal trigonometric ratio for this particular tangent line." he dropped his pencil and finished somewhat breathlessly, "Therefore, you are wrong." . + . + . _'But I can't seem to recall/can't seem to forget when you came along.'_ . + . + . "So you love me because I can do things like this?" almost giggling Eriol snapped his long finers and produced a blue flame in the palm of his hand, "How fickle." "I never said I loved you." Eriol made a waving gesture and the flame morphed into the shape of a dove, spiralling out of the cage of the mage's fingers and vying for the open sky. Just when it seemed as if it would make it, it's flight stalled and the creature burst into a hundred, translucent, ice-colored petals which slowly fluttered to the ground and dissapeared. Syaoran stared ahead blankly, unimpressed. "Come on." Eriol attempted a frown, "You have to admit, it was very beautiful." "Cheap parlor tricks." Syaoran sighed and turned his head, watching the very real cherry blossoms as they were caught in the wind on their decent towards the ground, dancing around each other in a crazy twirl of white and rose, "It's almost shameful seeing you use your power for such frivolous things." "There it is again. Honestly, Xiao Lang, it is all about the power with you." Syaoran didn't answer and Eriol sighed, shifting his weight against the rickety seat of the old-fashioned park bench they were seated on. It was mid evening in late October and the nighttime chills of winter had just begun to set in. Because of this, the park was empty despite it having been a beautiful day. Eriol stretched his arm out across the back of the bench and leaned over so that he could whisper within Syaoran's hearing. "It's surprising that you aren't proud, little wolf, seeing as no one has more magical aura than I do. Or do you not acknowledge me simply because you have me?" Syaoran turned his brown eyes towards Eriol, their clear irises having been turned flame red by the glare of the setting sun. His sour facial expression hardly shifted, but plainly said: 'What the hell are you talking about!?' "You've learned that the having isn't nearly so pleasureable as the wanting." Eriol explained, relaxing and training his eyes on the red sun falling into the horizen, "But you never really wanted me, did you Xiao Lang?" "That's not true." Syaoran murmered. "Hmm?" Eriol closed his eyes and listened. "Sometimes I..." Syaoran's face reddened at the cheeks and stopped. The mage opened one eye and looked at the chinese boy from the very corner of his vision, "Go on." "I never did like you." Syaoran reminded him, his voice that sort of half-growl it took on when the boy was admitting things, "But when I stopped thinking of you as a rival for Sakura's attention I..." he hesitated, "I still didn't like you because I found you... confusing." "Confusing?" this warranted both eyes to be open and a raising of an eyebrow. Eriol's glasses slipped down the bridge of his nose. "Don't think about it for too long. I'm an easily confused person." "Ah, and the wolf admits his faults for all to see!" Eriol fake-gasped dramatically and Syaoran shot him a sharp look. "I don't know why this all matters so much anyways. My feelings are inconsequential, I think the real question here is: Do you love me?" "Hmm?" Eriol tipped his head and salvaged his glasses from where they had been hanging percariously off the ridge of his arched nose. He shrugged, a heavy and meaningful motion that involved his whole body, "I do not love people. People love me and I indulge their affections until they either grow tired of my exhausting ways or something better comes along." That comment placed a wedge between words in their conversation. Syaoran appeared to be muling over the statement and finally, he said tonelessly: "And you think that I have problems with the concept of love?" "I never said I didn't." "And you never said that you did. So if I don't love you and you don't love me, then what the hell are we doing?" "I never said I didn't love you." "Yes you did. You just said that you don't love people, they love you." "That's not completely true. I was just trying to say that I don't love people in that strange, obsessive way you do. 'Romantic love', it's called in all the great novels, or some such rot." "And you don't love like that?" "I did in my youth, two hundred years ago." "Well, then what is this 'love' you're talking about?" "It's strange that the young think the only way to love someone is to pledge undying affection towards them in exchange for sexual gratification of varying degrees. There are many ways to love a person. The way a mother loves her son, or the way friends adore each other." "Then how do you love me?" "As a companion, Xiao Lang. The same way I loved Kaho and the way I love the Mistress Sakura." "Just a companion?" "A most enjoyable companion." Syaoran barked out a short laugh and stood, reaching out to entwine his fingers with Eriol's. "We should go. It's getting late." Eriol stared at their entwined fingers and gave Syaoran an inquisitive glance. The chinese boy tugged at his hand, pulling him to his feet and muttered cryptically: "The quiet is setting in. I can't have that." . + . + . _"Well, he wasn't completely lying when he said that..."_ "Tea?" _"... but the thing about Eriol is that he is a master of half-truths."_ "Um, no thank you..." _"So what you're trying to tell me is to be careful?"_ "Are you sure? You have yet to taste the finest Britain has to offer. I've got some fresh Earle Gray right here. Said to be the favorite tea of many a fine monarch." _"Not exactly. He's not dishonest."_ "Really, no thank you." _"But he's not honest either."_ "Hmm, hmm, hmm. Could it be that the indetermiable Xiao Lang is frightened of a little culture?" _"He's just that way out of necessity. I suppose if he's wasting so much time on you he really cares about you. Either that, or..."_ "I'm not scared of your British tea, Hiiragizawa. I'm scared of the stomach ache that barbaric stuff is going to give me if I slop it down as eagerly as you do." _"Or what?"_ "You orientals and your green cha. I doubt it's healthy to be raised on tea that phenomenally weak. Eale Gray is good for the heart and soul!" _"Ah... when he said that he didn't love people, they loved him... He was trying to tell you something."_ "Last time I checked, caffiene was actually a trigger of heart attacks in cases of those with health problems." _"Trying to tell me something? What are you talking about?"_ "Well, in large doses yes. but when diluted in a cup of _piping_ tea and sprinkled with sugar and cream it can be a most delightful pick up." _"Eriol has this habit of taking on charity cases in his relationships."_ "_Piping_? That word just does not translate well into either chinese or japanese. What the hell are you talking about?" _"Oh, well then. That makes me feel a lot better."_ "It's an English expression. It means, um, hot." _"No, no, no. Don't misunderstand. That was probably not the best wording I could have used. Sorry, I've been away from speaking Japanese for a while now."_ "Then why couldn't you just say 'hot' like every other normal human being on the planet?" _"Okay, I'll give you that. Then what WERE you trying to say?"_ "There's a bit more to it than that, Xiao Lang. It's more than just 'hot'. It means 'very hot'. Pleasently hot, in fact." _"Eriol is trying his best to be with you because he feels that you need something from him."_ "... I have a feeling that there is some sort of dirty undertone to that sentence. I'm not sure I want to get it." _"What could I possibly need from him?"_ "Xiao Lang! Do you trust me so little?" _"You are hurting, aren't you? Eriol is quite fond of soothing lonely hearts."_ "That as well. I'd say that I know you far better than I want to." _"Oh, I get it. Sakura leaves me, I get depressed and Eriol shows up because he considers me an enjoyable companion and wants to make sure I don't do anything stupid before that pain in me heals."_ Eriol didn't reply. He stirred his tea quietly, back to Syaoran and facing the window. The chinese boy tipped his head and wondered suddenly if he had said something wrong. _"It's something like that. But then again, I never really understoof Eriol so I could have his motives completely backwards. Who knows, maybe he really is hung up on you. Or maybe it's just another one of his games..." pause "Sorry I couldn't be of much help." "No. You've given me a lot to think about. Thank you Miss. Mizuki." "Please Syaoran! You can call me Kaho. I insist."_ Syaoran sighed and leaned back in his chair, studying the ceiling and tapping the front legs of the chair against the polished floor of his kitchen slowly. After a few moments Eriol came to sit across from him, sipping on his sticky smelling tea and wearing a contemplative expression. Syaoran slammed his chair flat onto the floor and studied his companion as he flipped through the newspaper without really reading it. The morning sun was just beginning to peak through the shades and careless beams of pale light cast themselves across Eriol's face in narrow bars. "What do you think I want from you?" Eriol snapped his head up and did his best 'deer-in-headlights' impression. His hand shook a bit and he placed his teacup evenly on the table, "Whatever do you mean by that, Xiao Lang." "I was just wondering. It doesn't seem that you want anything from me, so what is it you think I want from you?" Eriol aquired an incredelous look and seemed as if he were stifling forced giggles, "I honestly don't know what you want from me." "Oh, don't play innocent, Hiiragizawa." Syaoran rolled his dark eyes and leaned forwards heavily on the table so that his face was close enough to kiss Eriol's if he had wanted to, "It doesn't make any sense. Even a child could see it. Why else would someone like you have been after me in the first place?" Eriol's expression became perfectly blank. He tapped the edge of his spectacles just enough so that they slid down his nose ridge into a convinient beam of sunlight, The glare hid his eyes from view. It was so perfect, so calculated and so darkly magical a gesture that Syaoran's breath caught in his throat having observed it. He was reminded of that time in the library when the world had gone silent and suddenly he was convinced of Eriol's absolue and quiet beauty. "Xiao Lang." the magician began seriously. Syaoran drew back a bit and nodded, "When I found you here you were in a mess. Since you are someone I respect greatly I could not rightly leave you in that mess, so I fixed it the only way I knew how." Syaoran raised an eyebrow, "By pursuing a romantic relationship with me?" Eriol raised his face to meet Syaoran's gaze and the movement brought his eyes back into view. They were narrow and serious, lacking any of the barely contained bemusement they usually harboured, "You were hurt by love. The best way to heal a wound is to heal it with what it was opened by." "That seems like rather skewered logic to me. So what? If someone's cut open by a sword you just drive the weapon in deeper?" Eriol frowned and lowered his dark eyebrows dissaprovingly, "That's not the same thing, Xiao Lang, and you know it. I'm talking strictly in a psycological sense. There's no need bringing such technical and physical trivialities into the matter." Syaoran sighed and shifted his weight from one elbow to the other, "Okay. So I'm healed now. I don't feel the grief and the pain anymore. I've stopped freaking out in school and I don't periodically go deaf anymore. Why haven't you packed you bags and made your way back to England yet?" Eriol paused for a long, tense moment. He raised his hand slowly and deliberately, placing it softly on Syaoran's left cheek and allowing it to rest there, "Well, that all depends on you." Syaoran shuddered at the touch. It was gentle almost to the point of becoming unbearable, "What do you mean?" "If you want me to leave I will, but..." Syaoran pulled his face away from Eriol's hand and considered him a moment. There was something different in the way he held himself- a slight slouch, a tiny tremble and his lips quivered beneath that reagally arched British nose. "Are you trying to say that... you love me?" Syaoran wondered in bewilderment. The mage shifted and Syaoran leaned himself further over the table, forcing the other boy to meet his eyes, "You're saying that it's my decision?" Eriol blinked and slumped in his chair, defeated. It was a subtle action, something that only one intimately familiar with the dark haired boy's mannerisms would likely catch, "Fine, Xiao Lang. You've called my bluff." he looked at the chinese boy meaningfully and weakly, "But the question now is: what are you going to do with it?" Syaoran mulled over this momentarily. He hardly consulted himself, really, as he had already unconciously made the decision that day in the library when he first decided that it might be a good idea to kiss the British boy senseless. Perhaps it wouldn't be permenant and perhaps it wouldn't be easy, but it would be and that's all that really mattered. He grinned genuinely for the first time in nearly a year, feeling as if a great weight had been lifted from his shoulders. He caught Eriol's chin with one hand and nearly toppled forwards as he was only supporting his percarious position upon the table with one arm, but Eriol caught him and they fell into each other. It wasn't a brilliant kiss, or a particularily passionate one. In fact, it was clumsy and somewhat chaste and the entire ordeal sent the two toppling to the floor, Eriol's chair hitting the floor with a loud and painful thud. He yelped and scrambled away, rubbing his back painfully where the top bar of the chair had driven into it. He attempted a berating glare in the chinese boy's direction, but just ended up laughing. Syaoran stared dumbfounded for a moment, his own limbs all tangled up in themselves and the no longer piping contents of Eriol teacup imprinting a fair sized stain into his neatly pressed white shirt. _'I should be quite cross right now.' he thought, 'but considering this is all my fault, I really do feel like laughing.'_ So he did. . + . + . _"But he talked to you about love. That's really something." "Hmm? Really?" "He never talked to me about love. It was the one subject he avoided like the plauge. Yet with you, he discusses it open and freely." "I think that there are other reasons for that, Miss. Mizuki." "Okay, okay. I may be reading a little to deeply into things. Sometimes I begins to wonder if Eriol really is as complicated as he would have us all believe." "Oh, I don't think Eriol is complicated at all. He's just... convuluted. Like a bad Shakespeare play." "Hah. That does sound about right. Are you sure you really despise him so much? Especially since you've quit it with all that ridiculous 'Hiiragizawa' business. I think you're beginning to care about him a little, hmm?" "You know, Kaho. I think you just might be right..."_ la fin **POST FIC REFLECTIONS:** Ack! Was that a happy ending? What have I done!? *sobs uncontrollably*  
Um, yeah. I know, I know. All talk, no action but I wanted it to be quasi-realistic and more than a tad surrealistic. And man, was it fun to write. Anyways, this was a nice little detour off the path I've beaten for myself, and after this I suppose it's back to _Cessation_!  
By the way, I know Sakura trees bloom in April and everything, but autumn is more dramatic. ^ ^ And stuff. Besides, this is CLAMP we're talking about, so the Sakura trees can bloom and shed pretty, white leaves whenever they want to! Yey fanfiction!  
2003 Jenn "Sparky" Young  
aka Izzy Girl  
aka Cephied Variable  
cephied_variable@yoishness.zzn.com  
  
ff.n ID#12217 (Izzy Girl)  
fp.n ID#12217 (Cephied Variable)  



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